Dragon's Tooth is a problem

[Ovark.2514]

Lets count the ways:

1: It is really un-fun to fight against since you are hit no matter how far you go from the ele

2: The tooth animation is too far up to see properly

3: The ground telegraph is doesn't give an indication when the tooth will land.

4: As an ele you can no longer guarantee the combo finisher will land on the combo field.

Edited December 27, 2022 by Ovark.2514

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

Definitely needs at least the expanding red circle underneath the target like @Eddbopkins.2630 suggested.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

Lately the better Ele players have figured out some really really unintendedly powerful scepter combos that create situations where you actually can't avoid all of the damage. I don't mean "being smart and landing a burst at the right time" in the same way a Herald would have to do, as example. No, I mean you actually can't avoid this damage unless you are running some obscure build designed to invuln tank a ton of DPS for 6-10 seconds straight.

This is all happening due to the buffs to Dragon Tooth targeting btw. They begin the Dragon Tooth and then start slamming you with channeled ranged attacks that go under anti-projectile. These channeled attacks deal so much damage by themselves, that you have to dodge roll or block or you die. If you burn 2x dodge rolls then the Dragon Tooth hits you because you can't dodge for a 3rd and it follows you now. If you try to block, they will use unblockable CC to kill your block frames and then you're put into position to dodge several times to escape the channels again, setting you up to get smacked by DT. Even if you survive this onslaught, the combo immediately refreshes off of like a 6 second CD and they just spam it again on you. You will eventually run out of defensive mechanisms and get slammed by these combos and immediately die. Just want to stress again, the Eles can spam this massive burst over and over and over again, on like a 6 second cooldown. This burst they are using is similar damage output to a Berserker/Eagle Sic Em OWP Soulbeast full burst that is on a 30s and 60s CD.

All the while, they maintain all of that latent Ele immunity uptime from the several overly defensive mechanics they have. They are slightly less tanky than previous builds, if you can find a moment to hit them. But in a 1v1 situation their great offensive measure completely makes up for any straight defenses they've lost. The offensive pressure is so large that it brings into light the idea of "the best defense is a good offense".

It's getting to where Ele isn't just overperforming, it's like unacceptably stronger than other classes/builds right now. It's kind of ridiculous. If we were to write out a big list of different classes/builds and rate their aspects, Eles would be looking at: S tier damage, S tier defenses, S tier support potential.

I mean come on Arenanet, where is the balance team on this? This has gone on too long.

Stop buffing the Ele. It needs nerfing, not buffing.

Edited December 27, 2022 by Trevor Boyer.6524

[SleepyBat.9034]

If they want to keep the tracking part I think the damage needs to be reduced.

[Infusion.7149]

At least use the right skill name. It's "Dragon's Tooth". 🤣

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

34 minutes ago, Infusion.7149 said:

At least use the right skill name. It's "Dragon's Tooth". 🤣

No, lets talk about the thread topic, Dragon's Fang.

[ArthurDent.9538]

It's amazing to me how people are focusing so much on warrior when there are ele's (there's like 6+ really strong builds) running around.

[Dr Meta.3158]

I was called crazy when they released the (at that time, upcoming) patch notes on scepter. I said scepter FA weaver is already kindof oppressive in the right hands due to how difficult it is to even attempt to counterplay. This is just going to make it to where the players who already were doing this to be unstoppable and the average Joe to be able to reach those players previous level of oppressive gameplay. But alas, everyone without the ability to figure things out in game for themselves and wait for better players to make builds for them hsd this idea in their head that since this build wasn't all over the place, its not good.

The same line of discussion happened with the preview for the defense changes but with the focus on how busted spellbreaker would be because of how strong they already were again in the hands of a few dedicated players. Same story, different class.

It makes me think that if there is internal testing going on for these changes before they're released, then the game devs testing these changes are no better than the average player as evident by the Supreme lack in foresight whenever they rework something. Every time, someone who knows better warns them about the changes they're going to implement and they're ignored and ridiculed only for the playerbase to whine and moan about it later when everyone is doing the next oppressive thing. Then the people who know better describe exactly how to fix the issue without killing the build/class. It gets ignored and gets removed from even basic viability and then problem repeats with another class/build.

In short, just another day in guild wars 2.

[Kodama.6453]

36 minutes ago, ArthurDent.9538 said:

It's amazing to me how people are focusing so much on warrior when there are ele's (there's like 6+ really strong builds) running around.

There can be more than 1 balance problem at any given time.

That people consider warrior to be a problem and talk about it doesn't mean elementalist isn't. They both are.

[Zex Anthon.8673]

8s cooldown... wtf is this garbage. Might as well make it a passive aura that auto applies Dragon's Tooth to enemies near ele.

Edited December 28, 2022 by Zex Anthon.8673

[Shao.7236]

10 hours ago, SleepyBat.9034 said:

If they want to keep the tracking part I think the damage needs to be reduced.

That's the frustrating part of it. The skill is known to hit like a truck and making it track was bound to be noticed and problematic.

I'm guessing Anet really wanted people to know this in real time before queuing in a small coefficient nerf because otherwise everyone would be complaining that it would be pointless if it didn't hit hard like before which no matter what it is, that thing is like Spear of the Archemorous without much of the delay, CD, LoS complication and it hits in an AoE.

[SleepyBat.9034]

37 minutes ago, Zex Anthon.8673 said:

8s cooldown... wtf is this garbage. Might as well make it a passive aura that auto applies Dragon's Tooth to enemies near ele.

If you take the fire trait line it's 6.5 lol, don't forget Catalyst has a elite skill that resets the cool down.

[bethekey.8314]

They buffed it to lock on without adjusting it from its previous, almost never hitting state. For a guaranteed hit or defensive, it does WAY too much damage on WAY too short a cd. Currently one of the best skills in the game, easily.

Edited December 28, 2022 by bethekey.8314

[Stallic.2397]

The tracking is definitely needed for this skill. I played Scepter Catalyst before the weapon buff and all dragon tooth was used for was either the blast or a random aoe to throw into the middle of a big team fight. You never relied on it for damage.

 

Which is a shame because for most weapons, skill two is supposed to be your damage skill. 

 

In my opinion, most of Scepters buffs were for quality of life. I wouldn't get to crazy on nerfs. But Dragon tooth can be shaved in damage since the skill now has a much larger chance of hitting compared to before. 

[Kuma.1503]

I put scepter on my minion tempest. I have achieved a new level of power never before seen. 

[Infusion.7149]

Now that the thread has a proper title 😄, I'm just curious what people think is acceptable level of damage for the skill? Seriously want to know since WvW follows PVP balance usually for this sort of thing. In my experience it only hits about 6K? Maybe there's something I'm missing so please enlighten me. I'm certain Arenanet will nerf it as is customary , when they run out of ideas it's the "nerf ele" meme 🤣.

[Waffles.5632]

It can hit me for 8-9k in sPvP, and combined with the unintuitive timing/animation, and the large AOE, it's just absolutely bonkers atm. Really careless change by anet because just looks like they never even considered how it would act in any mode outside PvE.

Any build hovering around 18k hp is crying right now.

 

Edit: the CD is way too low as well

Edited December 28, 2022 by Waffles.5632

[Zex Anthon.8673]

31 minutes ago, Infusion.7149 said:

Now that the thread has a proper title 😄, I'm just curious what people think is acceptable level of damage for the skill? Seriously want to know since WvW follows PVP balance usually for this sort of thing. In my experience it only hits about 6K? Maybe there's something I'm missing so please enlighten me. I'm certain Arenanet will nerf it as is customary , when they run out of ideas it's the "nerf ele" meme 🤣.

Either increase the cooldown, or make it a channeled ability that can be interrupted. The issue is it is a set it and forget it skill. It has no other counterplay other than dodging.  Which opens up the opportunity for burst from the rest of the incredibly loaded ele kit.

[Stallic.2397]

3 hours ago, Zex Anthon.8673 said:

Either increase the cooldown, or make it a channeled ability that can be interrupted. The issue is it is a set it and forget it skill. It has no other counterplay other than dodging.  Which opens up the opportunity for burst from the rest of the incredibly loaded ele kit.

 

We're nerfing skills now because players don't want to dodge it??

 

Tell me you're a P2 duoQ player without actually saying you're a P2 duoQ player... 

Edited December 28, 2022 by Stallic.2397

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

4 hours ago, Kuma.1503 said:

I put scepter on my minion tempest. I have achieved a new level of power never before seen. 

But is it your final form?

[Leonidrex.5649]

4 hours ago, Infusion.7149 said:

Now that the thread has a proper title 😄, I'm just curious what people think is acceptable level of damage for the skill? Seriously want to know since WvW follows PVP balance usually for this sort of thing. In my experience it only hits about 6K? Maybe there's something I'm missing so please enlighten me. I'm certain Arenanet will nerf it as is customary , when they run out of ideas it's the "nerf ele" meme 🤣.

numbers in pvp and wvw are very different despite having same " balance ".
most players in wvw run with toughness so by default they take a lot less power dmg from attacks, its not unusual for this to take 50% of someones HP.
Again, important part is that most builds in pvp cant afford any toughness and runs with base values.

[Infusion.7149]

30 minutes ago, Leonidrex.5649 said:

numbers in pvp and wvw are very different despite having same " balance ".
most players in wvw run with toughness so by default they take a lot less power dmg from attacks, its not unusual for this to take 50% of someones HP.
Again, important part is that most builds in pvp cant afford any toughness and runs with base values.

I'm aware of that. I'm more worried that if it is nerfed for PVP it is also nerfed for WVW where massive amounts of toughness is common (although marauder's has none). It could probably have the same indicators as desert shroud for example without affecting the damage, at least for WVW.

It's very important to distinguish say 6K or 7K from full glass berserker builds with full damage traitlines compared to marauder or something and the 9K claimed above for PVP.

[MedievalThings.5417]

13 hours ago, bethekey.8314 said:

They buffed it to lock on without adjusting it from its previous, almost never hitting state. For a guaranteed hit or defensive, it does WAY too much damage on WAY too short a cd. Currently one of the best skills in the game, easily.

 

5 hours ago, Zex Anthon.8673 said:

Either increase the cooldown, or make it a channeled ability that can be interrupted. The issue is it is a set it and forget it skill. It has no other counterplay other than dodging.  Which opens up the opportunity for burst from the rest of the incredibly loaded ele kit.

I would gladly trade this skill for cloak and dagger, which hits just as hard AND grants stealth.

[Waffles.5632]

That's such a bad trade lolwhat.

A ranged fire and forget high damage AOE that self tracks it's target on an 8sec CD vs a melee attack????

 

8 sec CD = around 3 dragon teeth per team fight, if two eles thats 4-6 dragon teeth every team fight. Double Cata is a thing at higher play.

FYI 900 range is the second highest tier of ranged attacks, the distances being 600 | 900 | 1200

Oh also Dragon tooth has 10sec of burning too, you know, because why not.

Cloak and Dagger mechanically cannot even be compared.

FOR PERSPECTIVE - one dodge bar refunds what? every 7-10 secs?

At the very least, D-tooth should be 600 range if it wants to keep the AOE and Damage, but something has got to give.

 

Last Edit: Also, stealth is vastly overrated.

Thieves get entire trait lines and skills dedicated to stealth and that is why their stealth is good, but stealth on any other class at most offers brief respite and a chance at re-positioning. It doesn't block aoes, it doesn't block naked aimed skills, etc etc.

Putting stealth on most classes results in nothing being changed.

Putting Dragon Tooth on any class right now will skyrocket that class to the top because of how the skill is currently iterated. It's free ranged AOE/damage/high pressure.

Just press it off CD, no other skill required. If it misses, by the time the animation actually ends, it will be up in ~5secs to spam more. Literally the best way to use the skill atm is to just spam it off CD because of how insanely effective it is.  There is no judgment here that is just how to most efficiently use the skill atm.

Make the CD 15 secs and now eles have to think, which makes pvp better for everyone involved.

 

Edited December 28, 2022 by Waffles.5632

[Kodama.6453]

10 hours ago, Waffles.5632 said:

FYI 900 range is the second highest tier of ranged attacks, the distances being 600 | 900 | 1200

There is also the 1500 range tier, so 900 is the third highest tier of ranged attacks.